“No… I’m good, you prick.”
“Good show Quarrel. You survived once again, you old bandit. See you soon, my good man.”
“I will be here, James.”
Gus accepted his toasting once again with good humor. The past ‘Quarrel’ name reference had been when Gus referred to Nick’s shenanigans in their last tropical endeavor as a James Bond movie. Nick immediately connected Gus with Bond’s trusty sidekick in the ‘Dr. No’ movie, Quarrel. Gus reminded Nick at the time that Quarrel didn’t survive, so when Nick correctly assumed Frank Richert would have Gus’s boat, The Lucky Lady, bombed from orbit, he issued his first ‘good show, Quarrel’ upon surviving the Richert attack. Gus headed to Nick’s room with duct tape in hand.
*
Gil Montrose felt a sharp pin prick. He batted at it absently while sitting up in bed. Reaching for his water glass by the bed, Montrose noticed the tremble in his hand. By the time he brought the glass to his lips, his vision began to blur slightly. After gulping down some water, he rattled the glass around on the nightstand before losing control of it. The glass tumbled down to the carpeted floor. Sweat ran down his face. A painful tightening in Gil’s chest caused him to collapse again across his bed, gasping for breath. The nightstand light clicked on. Gil squinted at the smiling face hovering over him. Terrifying recognition lanced through his already panicking brain.
“Ni…Nick? Oh… oh God.”
“Hi Gil. I sure wish I had more time to spend with you, buddy. What times we would have in your last hours.” Nick sat next to Gil on the bed. “I bet you thought you were the sneakiest little bugger ever. My partner advised me to leave you alone. I agreed, but I figured you couldn’t leave well enough alone.”
Nick sighed, shaking his head in a sorrowful manner. “I was right. Now look what you went and did.”
Gil clutched Nick’s arm. “Please… please help me!”
Nick patted Gil’s hand. “You’re a little late for help. I’m here for you though, right to the end. I believe you’ve had a massive coronary. The real pain in your chest is unfortunately only now due to begin. Hold on tight, pal.”
Montrose gasped as sharp stabs of intense pain shot through him. Nick’s hands prevented the spasms from launching Gil off the bed. The final violent shudder rocketed through the man in Nick’s strong grasp. Montrose relaxed, eyes wide open, in the all-seeing stare of eternity. Nick patted the man’s cheek with his gloved hand.
“There you go, Gil. Paid in full.” Nick stood up, surveyed the room with professional caution, turned out the light, and left.
*
Gus vibrated uncomfortably in the turbo prop’s cargo area. He and Nick sat braced against opposing bulkheads amongst crates and bags. Nick grinned, watching his partner stir in silent discontent from side to side.
“Did you have to get us an ‘Indiana Jones’ ride out of there?”
“I knew it wouldn’t be long before you started whining, Gus. We’re lucky my cleanup crew arrived so quickly. Those big wheeled trunks are hard to come by. My people demonstrated admirable skill when they obtained those in record time.”
Gus grimaced. “What’s the purpose of bringing the damn bodies with us?”
“We couldn’t very well leave them in Fujairah, especially since our old friend Gil would be found this morning. My cleanup guys are more than competent, but I didn’t want to burden them with disposal. Khalil has a trucker friend in Riyadh who can be trusted to take our four guests out into the sand. He and I have worked together before. All the right palms will get greased once he lands us in Riyadh. We’ll catch a flight out of Riyadh tomorrow. I have a meeting to attend tonight with one of Gil’s bosses. She’s the CIA section chief. Carol recruited me out of Delta Force for a time. I stayed with the Company for five years. I got the hell out after they left me in Libya without a ride. Some complications after a hit I did for them in the sandbox, a lot like we just did, caused repercussions. They decided I was a liability.”
“Jesus, Nick, how the hell did you get out of there?” Gus saw the Terminator face meet his inquisitive stare with coldly grinning countenance.
“Six weeks crawling through hell. Now you know why I like Pacific Grove, sitting on my Otter’s Point beach, coffee in hand early in the morning with you and Deke the dog. I never got over that crawl out of Libya. It fried some of my circuit breakers.”